Cyber Safety/Social Media

Dear Parents and Carers

The digital or ‘virtual’ world is a very exciting and ever changing experience for both our youngsters and ourselves. Like me I guess, sometimes you are overwhelmed at the speed of change and struggle to keep up with the latest innovations, inventions and apps and devices. Equally, the potential and real dangers of the internet and of other digital communication is constantly there and developing in new and unexpected ways. At school we try to ‘educate’ our youngsters, encouraging them to use and exploit the fantastic resources but to also be aware of the potential dangers and pitfalls. To help in this aim, the school provides learning opportunities about cyber bullying/cyber safety in a series of lessons and assemblies. All year groups have received this information.

To watch an animation designed by one of our year 12 students which highlights the dangers of uploading inappropriate images click here. http://youtu.be/1S8RpsBvcM0

Research shows that a school’s influence though is only about 20%. Your role, in talking through your child’s digital ‘behaviours’ is vastly more influential and we would really encourage you to be having regular conversations, debates and ‘show and tells’ with your children.

You will find some information and suggestions below and we would strongly advise you to attend one of our regular internet safety evenings. Please be as involved in your child’s virtual life as you are in their real one; the dangers AND the benefits are just as important.

Here are some comments made by parents who attended our 'cyber safety' presentation.

'Don't miss it, its well worth coming to this presentation'.

'As a very cautious computer user (very limited knowledge) this talk gave me very clear pointers how to increase my knowledge and set up safety devices'.

'Covered a large subject in a concise way'.

'Despite being quite computer and technology savvy, it was very surprising to learn of the problems on social networking'.

'We would like to thank you for putting on the Cyber Safety Meeting, which we attended last night. We found it a real eye opener and were so glad we went. It really helped for us to be able to approach our children with some valuable knowledge, to keep them safe and sensible using their computer and mobiles. We were able to know how to step up the security on the computer, social networking sites and gadgets for them and us!'

HMG Cyber Schools Programme

The HMG Cyber Schools Programme, being delivered as Cyber Discovery, is part of an ambitious skills programme designed to grow the UK's cyber capable workforce. It is intended to create a step change in specialist cyber security education and training for students in years 10-13 (14-18 year olds) across England. The aims of the extracurricular programme are to promote cyber security as an exciting and recognised career choice and to equip students with some of the skills needed to enter the cyber security profession. Cyber Discovery will also identify elite young talent and accelerate their entry into and interest in the cyber security profession.

Princes Risborough School is now a registered centre for Cyber Discovery. If you'd like to sign up to this exciting new programme, please follow this link: Join Cyber Discovery

The school recommends the use of the following websites to find out more information.